I have contributed a chapter to the latest GCWA (Gulf Coast Writers Association) anthology called Mississippi Profiles. I wrote about an ancestor, Claudius V.H. Davis, who fought in the Civil War and was later awarded the Confederate Medal of Honor for his actions at the Battle of Peachtree Creek. He was one of only 50 recipients of the medal.

The book just came out and the ebook is being worked on, but I know it is available at some locally owned bookstores on the Gulf Coast, namely Southern Bound Book Shop on Eisenhower in Biloxi.

My father in law is dying of brain cancer. He had an egg-sized tumor removed two months ago and underwent all kinds of chemo and radiation and now he can barely move or talk. We are all hopeful for recovery, but just don't know what the next day holds because he has another smaller tumor that the doctors haven't even looked at yet. Please pray for him.

On top of all that is going on, we got some really bad news yesterday. My father in law is a co-owner in a pretty good size local office supply business. He always thought that he had a half-million dollar life insurance policy. However, we found out that the business has a half-million dollar policy on him. If he dies, the business gets $500,000 and his wife gets jack squat.

This type of life insurance is called a 'key man' policy where a small business insures itself against the loss of an owner. I don't know if my father in law got screwed over by his partners or was simply misinformed. Either way, it's too late do to anything about it now. He does have enough stock in the company that his wife could sell it back and be OK as far as bills and paying off the house, but the whole situation really sucks.

Long story short, make darn sure you got all your insurance matters in order, no matter how young you think you are, because the time might come when it is too late to do anything about it if there is a problem or you come up short. My father in law is in his early 50's. A few months ago, none of us would ever have expected something like this to happen.

Where I hunt in southwest Mississippi, deer season always begins on Saturday morning of the weekend before Thanksgiving. In all my life, for I’ve been hunting as long as I can remember, I have never missed opening day. It’s like a family tradition. This year, 2008, was no different.

My alarm went off at 3:30am and I quickly snoozed it for another 10 minutes, but after that I knew I had to get up. I had a two-hour drive to the hunting camp and needed to be there by sunrise, which was around 6:45. I stumbled down the hallway to the living room couch and turned on the TV to help wake me up. In case you ever wondered what’s on that early in the morning, or that late at night depending on how you look at it, let’s just say you aren’t missing much. I eventually got my stuff together and was on the road by 4:45am.

The drive from my house to the hunting camp, which is on private family-owned property, consists mainly of Interstate travel with the last twenty or so miles going through back roads that eventually turn to gravel logging roads. Just as I was turning off the last bit of pavement, a doe ran out in front of me and I had to slam on the brakes to keep from hitting her. I took this as a good sign that the deer were moving.

I arrived at the hunting camp right at 7am and it was pretty cold outside, but not freezing. I debated whether or not to even wear a jacket over my three layers of shirts, then a cold breeze hit me and I knew the jacket was going on. Within a few minutes, I was walking down a long trail toward an area where I’d seen a lot of deer activity last year. My dad and a friend were already there from camping out the night before, and we’d agreed earlier on where everyone was going so we wouldn’t cross paths and mess up each other’s hunt.

After about twenty minutes of still hunting, a young spike buck emerged from a clearing and presented a nice broadside shot for me, but unfortunately it is illegal to shoot any buck of less than four points in the state of Mississippi. I tried to take a picture of the deer with my cell phone, but he saw me and darted away. I stood by and watched him meander on through the woods because I didn’t want to spook him too bad in case there were other deer around.

As I moved further into the woods, I suddenly saw a huge mass of movement up ahead, but the woods were so thick I couldn’t make out anything. I wasn’t sure if it were several deer or a small pack of coyotes. Because the ground was so dry and I couldn’t risk making a bunch of noise by moving, I stayed hidden behind a tree and eventually lost sight of whatever it was until I walked ahead about forty yards.

That mass of movement I had seen earlier was a doe with three yearlings. I’d never before seen so many little ones with one doe, and those yearlings were literally running circles around her. It reminded me of how my young nieces run around their grandparent’s house. I watched them all through my scope for a while, as they were oblivious to my being there. Although none of them had any spots, I wouldn’t dare shoot a doe with young ones around, nor would I take such a young deer. Compared to the full grown doe, they were all very small.

I didn’t see any more deer for the rest of the day, although I did spot an opossum and an armadillo digging around in the woods. Squirrels and woodpeckers were aplenty, as usual. I think it was a little too dry for a decent hunt, because the leaves crunched too loudly under foot. The hunting usually doesn’t get good until there’s been a solid overnight freeze, which just hasn’t happened yet.

Tomorrow morning, I will be headed back out to do it all over again. I’m bringing leftover turkey sandwiches with me this time.

Anybody here use Blogspot? It's run by Google and I like it a lot. I started a gaming blog on there called The Bald Gamer. I'm going to make a logo or something for it, too. I plan to use it as a point of reference for all the gaming reviews I write on Brighthub and Epinions. Check it out!

One of the things that has always bugged me about PC gaming is when I get a buggy game. Why is it that console games are released with much higher standards? It's like so many PC games get released with bugs so they can be patched later. It's no wonder so many industry insiders worry about the future of PC gaming.

Legend: Hand of God is a perfect example of the 'release now and patch later' mentality. This game had a lot of potential to be great, as it combined many elements of games like Titan Quest, but it is so damn buggy that I gave up playing it. I felt like I was beta testing the software, when that's something the developer should have done before releasing it to market.

I think this game still has some potential, but until they work out the bugs and release a major update, it's not worth your time or money. Why pay for something unfinished?

I love Skechers shoes. They always have the weirdest designs. I picked up a pair of these today, to replace my Sperry's as work shoes. Those deck shoes just aren't that comfortable for walking around a lot. These things feel like tennis shoes.